In the restaurant world, nothing matters more than its reputation. There’s nothing worse for a restaurant’s reputation than word getting out that they made their customers sick or failed a health inspection. If you want to preserve your restaurant’s sterling reputation, then food safety compliance must be a major priority.
Curious how you can make food safety and proper sanitation a breeze for you and your staff? Read on for three tips that’ll keep your restaurant up to par.
Create a Food Safety Plan for Your Restaurant
The best thing you can do to help prevent food safety issues and encourage proper sanitation is to create a solid food safety plan for your staff to follow. Throwing one together to meet FDA requirements isn’t enough!
Take the time to identify all of the food contamination hazards in your restaurant. Thoroughly detail the steps you’ll take on a daily basis to eliminate foodborne illness risks. Once you have the plan, make sure you have all the tools necessary to carry out your plan successfully.
Want to beef up your food safety compliance system? Consider incorporating food safety software into your restaurant to take things to the next level. It’ll have all of the food safety tasks you’ve planned and completed at your fingertips.
Train Your Employees Regularly
Having a food safety plan is not effective if your employees don’t know it inside and out. All employees who work with food need to receive training on how to comply with all of your food safety goals when they’re hired. You should also conduct refresher trainings on an annual basis to keep your employees up to date with the plan and any changes you made to it.
If you’re noticing that some employees are struggling with food safety, don’t hesitate to schedule more training time.
Proper Food Storage Is Key
The best way to do things like eliminating cross-contamination is to focus on proper food storage.
Make sure that all of your pre-prepped food items are kept in areas with proper holding temperatures. For restaurants with multiple floors, a dumbwaiter lift can speed up the delivery of food, avoiding the issue of cold food and potential contamination. Use labels and color-coding systems to distinguish between cutting boards for meats, vegetables, and dairy. Even better, prepare raw foods in a totally different part of the kitchen.
In addition to all of that, stay on top of things like sweeping and mopping the floors and taking out the garbage. Wipe down and sanitize the counters frequently. The more prevention you do, the less response you have to worry about!
Make Food Safety Compliance Your Top Priority!
No one expects a restaurant’s kitchen to be perfect every second of every day.
You know that during peak periods of service, things can get downright chaotic. That’s why it’s so critical to have a solid food safety compliance plan on which all of your staff have been trained. Taking this extra step ensures that your restaurant and your career stick around for years to come!
Do you want to learn about more awesome ways to make your restaurant a success? We’re here to help. Check out the rest of our blog to learn about the latest in business and marketing!